How Bruce Springsteen's 'Born to Run' almost died in Kutztown

Rocker was so unhappy after first hearing finished album that he tossed it into Kutztown hotel swimming pool. Then he drove to New York to kill the project, according to new book.

Bruce Springsteen was so unhappy after first hearing 'Born to Run'… (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO, AMAZON.COM )

April 06, 2013|By John J. Moser, Of The Morning Call

On a July evening in 1975, a rising musician who had critics fawning but hadn't yet captured the fancy of the general public was at a Kutztown hotel during a two-night stand at the state college.

His manager appeared at the hotel room door, carrying a fresh test copy of the just-completed album the singer had labored over for an agonizing year and a half. The artist gathered his band and dropped the acetate disc on a portable record player he carried with him on the road to hear the fruits of his labor, believing it would be the breakthrough his career needed.

The singer was so dissatisfied with what he heard that he snatched the disc from the turntable, stalked out to the hotel courtyard and flung it into the swimming pool. He then piled his management team into a car for a drive back to New York to scrap the project.

Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run" almost died in Kutztown.

That's the vivid story told in "Bruce," a new authorized biography of Springsteen, who went on to become one of the top-selling, most honored and most influential artists of all time, with 23 gold or platinum discs, 20 Grammy Awards, 120 million albums sold worldwide and legions of fanatical fans.

"Born to Run" was perhaps the most important record in Springsteen's career, containing his career-defining title track. It sold 6 million copies and, 38 years later, remains his biggest-selling studio disc besides 1984's "Born in the U.S.A."

Author Peter Ames Carlin, who also has written biographies of Paul McCartney and the Beach Boys' Brian Wilson, wrote "Bruce" with Springsteen's cooperation. Carlin sat for interviews with the singer, his family, his management and his band members. His book includes what likely is the last major interview with Springsteen saxophonist Clarence Clemons, who died in 2011.

The story of the Kutztown incident involving "Born to Run" is key to illustrating Springsteen's life and career, Carlin said in an email interview.

"You're always looking for the big themes in an artist's life, but those usually emerge through the quotidian details of ordinary life," he said.

The Kutztown story also shows how the Lehigh Valley area was important to the development of Springsteen's career.

Springsteen's then-manager, Mike Appel, who in a telephone interview largely confirmed the book's account, put it this way:

"It was just one of those moments," Appel said. "His fear of letting go got the best of him. It was the background for the greatest album of all time. It was a momentous moment, and it happened right there."

Playing in the Valley

Springsteen grew up and started his musical career in Freehold, N.J., two hours east of Allentown and less than 20 miles inland from the beach, so it's no surprise the vast majority of his early shows were at venues along the Jersey Shore and in New York City.

But as Springsteen's reputation as a performer grew, he branched out to playing Pennsylvania shows. The online Springsteen fan database Killing Floor at http://www.brucespringsteen.it has him playing in the state as early as October 1972 at West Chester State College, where he's credited with a homecoming show.

Springsteen also played several legendary series of shows at the Main Point, a now-closed club in Bryn Mawr, Delaware County — the first in January 1973, around the time of the release date of his debut album, "Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J."

One connection that brought Springsteen to frequent shows in the Lehigh Valley area in the years after that was a member of his then-management team, Bob Spitz. Spitz, who was with Springsteen until 1978, is a Reading native who graduated from Reading High School in 1967 and Albright College in Reading in 1971.

David Johnson, Kutztown University's assistant director of university relations, who previously worked for Albright College, said Spitz was commencement speaker for Albright in May 2012, and "talked about finding venues for [Springsteen] to play in so they could get his name out there."

Springsteen made his first recorded appearance in the Lehigh Valley area at what was then Kutztown State College, opening for Stevie Wonder in the 2,500-seat Keystone Hall as part of the school's Black Cultures Weekend on March 29, 1973.

But Spitz said "it was an unfortunate pairing."

"We did the Stevie Wonder date as a favor to our agent, Sam McKeith, at the William Morris Agency, who was also Stevie's agent [and friend]," Spitz said. "But the two acts were largely incompatible. And, as always, Bruce was dissatisfied with being an opening act because audiences tend to walk around and talk during the opening acts and he felt as if he wasn't connecting with the kids."

After Springsteen released his second album, "The Wild, The Innocent and the E Street Shuffle," in September 1973, he played two sold-out shows April 29, 1974, at Northampton's Roxy Theater that were promoted and sponsored by former radio station WSAN-FM, according to the fan database.